A jury in Washington County recently found a Frederick, Maryland man guilty in the St. Patrick’s Day 2022 shooting death of Hagerstown resident Jermaine Reed II in Hagerstown’s West End.
During the week-long trial, testimony was given on Thursday, June 27, by a co-defendant in the case who gave Hagerstown police information that Kyeron, or Kye’ron, Zaimere Cottingham, also known as “Kruddy,” was the second shooter in the car both men were in during the daytime shooting.
Cottingham, 27, was convicted the next day on 18 charges, including first-degree murder, for which he faces a maximum sentence of life in prison.
Washington County District Court Judge Brett R. Wilson has ordered a pre-sentence investigation in Cottingham.
Cottingham is the first of four suspects to appear in court in this murder case.
Two co-defendants, including the other shooter and the man who testified against Cottingham, previously entered into plea agreements. A trial is scheduled for later this summer for the alleged fourth man in the car, the driver.
Assistant District Attorney Brock Shriver told the jury that Reed was shot five times, but that 32 casings — a mix of two different calibers — were found at the crime scene after the shooting on Tuesday afternoon, March 17, 2022. Shriver said the defendants went on a “hunt” for Reed.
Two people in the backseat of a white Honda Accord shot Reed, an incident captured on surveillance camera. But Hagerstown police struggled to identify a fourth person in the car, who was the second shooter.
Chief Detective Shawn Weaver testified that Weaver did not hear about Cottingham until his accomplice Bradley Nathan Walker told police that the second shooter in the car was Cottingham.
Defense attorney Elizabeth Connell, who represented Cottingham on behalf of the public defender’s office, said it was not Cottingham who was in the car. She told the jury that Cottingham was not there and that Walker was portraying Cottingham as a “scapegoat.”
Connell argued that Walker could not be believed because of the clemency deal he had received in exchange for his testimony.
Connell also questioned Weaver about several other suspects, who the detective said turned up nothing.
Cottingham did not testify and the defense did not call any witnesses.
Reed, 27, was sitting in his car on Alexander Street, near Dale Street, in the West End when the Honda pulled up next to Reed and two people leaned out the back windows and began shooting at him and his car. Reed got out of the car and ran north on the sidewalk as the gunmen continued to fire. Reed collapsed to the sidewalk and later died at Meritus Medical Center east of Hagerstown.
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According to court documents, Walker, 25, is expected to testify later this summer in the murder trial of the other suspect, Berquan Howard Carroll, 25, of Hagerstown.
Walker, wearing jeans and a black T-shirt and with much shorter hair than it was at the time of the shooting, appeared as a witness on the fourth day of the trial.
He and Carroll were arrested the day after the shooting. But Walker did not share information about the case with police until May 2023, after signing a deal that granted clemency in exchange for his testimony.
Walker signed a plea deal with prosecutors in May 2023, pleading guilty to a felony count of conspiracy to commit first-degree assault in exchange for his testimony against co-defendants. He signed the deal before identifying the people in the Honda, including telling police that Cottingham was the second shooter, according to interrogation and trial testimony.
The agreement means that the other charges, including first-degree murder, will remain on the docket, with the possibility that they could be dropped after a few years.
Although Walker has not yet been sentenced, the state is recommending that he be sentenced to 25 years, with all but time served suspended, and that he be on probation for five years, Connell said. Walker was released from prison in late May 2023 after serving more than 14 months, according to court records. He is under house arrest with GPS monitoring as he awaits sentencing.
Connell questioned Walker about inconsistencies in various statements he made, from things he said to police to testimony at trial. Most of the questions revolved around events after the shooting, including his trip to Virginia with Carroll and Walker’s encounter with a woman he had been involved with. in an attempt to get rid of the Honda.
The defense attorney argued that Walker had no memory problems, but that he was unable to keep his story consistent.
Deputy District Attorney Sarah Mollett-Gaumer, the lead prosecutor in the case, later noted that Walker was consistent in his testimony when it came to the details surrounding the murder. The prosecutor also said that Walker had an incentive to tell the truth on the stand because if he lies, the plea agreement is “null and void.”
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Walker testified that he had been smoking marijuana, a regular activity for him, with Carroll in City Park earlier on the day of the shooting. He said he sold marijuana to co-defendant Kevin Nunn that day, but that he had not sold marijuana before.
Walker testified that he did not have a weapon at the time of the shooting and was wearing a ski mask, the latter of which he wore “essentially every day” at the time. He said he did not know who Reed was until after the shooting.
When Mollett-Gaumer asked Walker what he was thinking at that moment, Walker said, “It was a crazy moment.”
When asked why he went with armed men and drove through Hagerstown, Walker said, “I just went with the flow.” He said he “had nothing else to do that day” and “let other people run my life.”
At the time of his indictment, Walker had an address north of Clear Spring. He testified that he was not from Hagerstown and that he and Carroll had attended Frederick High School and that they were from the Carver neighborhood in downtown Frederick. Walker said he knew Nunn from the same neighborhood. Walker and Carroll had recently met again and worked together at a business in the Williamsport neighborhood.
Kevin Dwayne Nunn, 29, of Walkersville, Maryland, was sentenced in March to the maximum 40 years in prison after pleading guilty last year to second-degree murder. Walker testified at Cottingham’s trial that Nunn was the other man in the backseat who shot Reed.
Motive for shooting of Jermaine Reed II unclear
The motive for the shooting is unclear.
Mollett-Gaumer said Carroll had some sort of conflict with Reed.
Nunn and Cottingham, who was described as Carroll’s brother, met up with Carroll and Walker. The four used another vehicle to drive around town looking for Reed. When they found him, they returned to where their other vehicles were, in a parking lot behind the Arts & Entertainment District Parking Deck in downtown Hagerstown, and got into the Honda.
The Honda then drove back to where Reed was waiting in his car for someone, and that’s when the shooting occurred, prosecutors said.
Connell argued that Walker set up Reed’s murder because they were both in a relationship with the same woman and Reed had threatened her.
This article originally appeared on The Herald-Mail: Frederick man found guilty in 2022 fatal shooting in Hagerstown
